http://cleantechnica.com/2012/09/11/why-thorium-nuclear-isnt-featured-on-cleantechnica/
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/nuclear/ https://www.facebook.com/GreensAgainstNuclear http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/20216b54-8f53-11e3-9cb0-00144feab7de.html http://www.earthcomms.org/pro-nuclear-greens-dare-not-speak-out/ http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/the-curious-wavefunction/2013/02/06/top-5-reasons-why-intelligent-liberals-dont-like-nuclear-energy/ You get the idea. There's no solar solution at hand. There is only complaint and EPA-type ruling worldwide, that doesn't address rising oceans which is the AGW focus. I wonder what MG Kern would say? ;-) Oh, well. -----Original Message----- From: Jesse Mazer <[email protected]> To: everything-list <[email protected]> Sent: Thu, Mar 13, 2014 9:36 am Subject: Re: The situation at Fukushima appears to be deteriorating On Thu, Mar 13, 2014 at 6:45 AM, <[email protected]> wrote: Yes, I realize you are opposed to GMO, You really have no reading comprehension! My whole point was that I have NO OBJECTION to GMOs. I said "I have no patience with the view (all too common among those on the left) that GMOs are a dangerous health risk since all the scientific experts I've seen say that extensive study has shown no more health risks from GMOs than from crops created through selective breeding", which means I DON'T think there is any elevated risk because I TRUST SCIENTISTS IN GENERAL, regardless of which political "side" is trying to oppose some of their research. I acknowledge that you are confident of the climate alarmists I place confidence in climate SCIENTISTS when they themselves are strongly confident about an issue in their field, just like I would with any other natural scientists. But I guess in your world, "climate scientist" is basically synonymous with "climate alarmist". , yes, you concede that some Red-Greens (there are none others) oppose nuclear fission, you would say some of them, and I will claim nearly all. Of course you can present no evidence for this view, you judge things based on cartoonish images of "leftists" in your mind (formed in bygone days I bet--how old are you, out of curiosity?) rather than reality. You write of solar as if it now at hand, to replace dirty energy with the clean. I simply said my understanding is that it would be technically and economically feasible to replace fossil fuels with solar, which is not to say it is "at hand" because it would still be quite expensive and the politicians are not in agreement about the urgency of a major Apollo-like program to get this done. You have no comment on the inconsistency of the power elites' behavior, in not behaving as if there is no climate change, yet advocating it as public policy, as if it were true. You have dismissed this inconsistency as due to the elites' short-term thinking, and concur with the scientists who are employed by these people. I do ascribe nefarious, motives, to the scientists, as no one else dares to. And as I said, you seem to have a double standard about scientists, unless you are broadly skeptical about ALL scientific claims whose detailed basis you don't understand. If you were consistent, you would be open to the possibility that evolution-deniers, HIV/AID deniers, and other crackpots who dispute various theories are correct that scientists are colluding to cover up the weakness in the evidence in these theories...but I bet you DO trust the scientists in these cases, even without understanding the detailed evidence. If you are not broadly skeptical of all science, that means that you trust science when it doesn't conflict with your ideology, but spin unfalsifiable narratives of shady conspiracies when it doesn't. By the way, what's with all the out-of-place commas in your writing? "nefarious, motives"? Simon, pure, they are not. But this is mere, observation, and you will dismiss this. As to physics, and chemistry, geology, and astronomy, the life sciences, I am ok, fine, with what they pursue. What they pursue (no matter political affiliation) are, at least, not funded by greedy politicians, Um, all sciences rely on government funding (grants etc.), physics just as much as climate science. And I'm pretty sure professors of climate science aren't any richer than other science professors, becoming a university professor is not the most lucrative profession. But anyway, thanks for confirming that you DO have exactly the double standard about scientists that I suggested. who are themselves funded by billionaire elites and their PAC's. Please invoke the Koch Brothers and I will be happy to list George Soros's influence in politics and his world view. I'm sure you would love it if I would invoke the Koch brothers so you could get back to what you love, which is science-free hot air about politics, but as I said I'm not interested in that (plus I'm afraid I don't live up to your cartoon stereotype of a leftist who believes America would be much different if not for the baleful influence of those villainous Koch bros.) Thorium reactors, molten salt, or liquid fluoride might be safer, but I am not sure, I don't know. If molten salt comes in contact with water or air, I have read it could combust, and combust, furiously. Hence, my re-focus on solar, out of necessity. Yet, we are being told that there's no time for this development of solar, by greens. Which "greens" are saying this? Can you name any names, or is it just another example of checking what the fantasy figures in your head would say rather than consulting reality? Most of the mainstream environmental groups with any real political clout seem to favor long-term plans that would result in a gradual reduction of emissions and replacement with renewable energies like solar over several decades, similar to the emissions reductions goals the EU has set for itself (and they have successfully reduced emissions by 18% since 1990 when they set these goals, as I mentioned earlier). Proposals like a carbon tax and a carbon cap would be included in this, since the proposals involve starting with a tax/cap that wouldn't require any major immediate change in what fossil fuel companies are doing, and then gradually make it a tiny bit stricter each year over a period of decades. What do they want us to do, a rational person may ask (assuming we can find one)? The great booming word from environmentalists is conservation, followed by the sound of chirping crickets, yes, there's a few crickets still alive after massive species decimation. As I said to John Clark, no scientists really claim there has been a massive decimation of species (percentage-wise anyway) at present, the claim is that the RATE of extinction (percent of species going extinct PER YEAR) has shot up in recent years, and that if it continues at this rate for another century (or a few centuries depending on the estimate of the current rate) then we will have a true mass extinction. Jesse When the discussion turns from technology to government control, and the necessity for it as promoted by pols who cite scientists, my spider-sense becomes active. Yes, there a few spiders left after environmental degradation. -----Original Message----- From: Jesse Mazer <[email protected]> To: everything-list <[email protected]> Sent: Thu, Mar 13, 2014 12:47 am Subject: Re: The situation at Fukushima appears to be deteriorating On Wed, Mar 12, 2014 at 7:36 PM, <[email protected]> wrote: My integrity is not the issue, Yes it is, since you made an error in your reading of the Royal Society/National Academy of Sciences paper, and instead of admitting the error you simply ignore the issue even when I repeatedly question you about it. for someone who states- This all falls under "gossipy political speculations about human motivations", I'm not interested in dragging this stuff into a conversation about natural science Not sure what connection you think there is between this statement of mine and "integrity". Would you respect my integrity more if I made up unfalsifiable fantasy narratives about the nefarious motives of conservatives and global warming deniers to counter your equally unfalsifiable fantasy narratives about the nefarious motives of liberals and environmentalists? Again, its science when its on your own terms, and it suits your ideology. Not at all, as I said to John Clark I treat it as the default position that whenever scientists in a field of natural science express confidence about ANY technical claim in their field, and there doesn't seem to be substantial disagreement among them, then my starting assumption is that they are most likely right about this claim (an assumption I would only be likely to change if I acquired enough knowledge the field to understand the detailed basis for the claims myself and find technical reasons to doubt them, or if I found out that some substantial number of other scientists disputed the claim). This is a blanket view of all natural science claims that has nothing to do with political ideology, for example I have no patience with the view (all too common among those on the left) that GMOs are a dangerous health risk since all the scientific experts I've seen say that extensive study has shown no more health risks from GMOs than from crops created through selective breeding. Anyone who does NOT adopt this blanket view of scientific claims is almost certainly filtering their evaluations of science through their personal ideology, and lacking respect for the importance of detailed technical understanding when evaluating scientific issues. I suspect your understanding of the detailed evidence behind many other scientific claims, like estimates of the age of the universe in cosmology, is just as poor as your understanding of the evidence surrounding global warming, but I imagine you don't put forth fantasy narratives of cosmologists peer-pressuring each other into accepting each other's models and wildly exaggerating the strength of the evidence for their theories, presumably because you have no ideological reason to dispute the idea that the Big Bang happened 13.75 billion years ago. Unless you are equally skeptical about *all* scientific claims whose technical basis you don't understand, you have a clear double standard--mistrust the scientists when their claims conflict with your ideology, but trust them when there is no such ideological conflict. Your nuclear energy remediation proposal will be violent opposed by your green chums, so it becomes, effectively, no answer. Certainly there are plenty of "greens" who oppose nuclear power (and examples like Fukushima show the risks are not to be scoffed at, although they are mainly risks to human health rather than environmental risks), but also plenty of greens who have come around to the view that nuclear power is a lesser evil when compared to fossil fuels, see for example this article that details many leading environmentalists who have become more nuclear-friendly (I suspect the number would be higher if we had thorium reactors, which should be significantly safer): http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/23/AR2009112303966.html Meanwhile, you completely ignored my point about it being well within the range of possibility to get all our energy from solar. I will prove your prediction correct with pure volition. I read the Nature realclimate link, article and my take away is its a struggle to try to figure out where the IPCC predictions went wrong? Was it el nino, heat sinks in the Pacific, etc. I'm glad you at least looked at it, but as with the Royal Society/National Academy of Sciences paper, your understanding of what you read seems to be quite poor (perhaps because you read with the attitude of "looking for flaws" rather than just trying to understand what's being argued). No one says the cooling is because of El Niño, but rather because La Niña has replaced El Niño for a while (part of a long-term cycle called 'pacific-decadal oscillation'), and the La Niña stage is thought to be ASSOCIATED WITH more heat being stored in the pacific, not a separate phenomenon that could be construed as a conflicting explanation. From the link at http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/12/the-global-temperature-jigsaw/ -- "Leading U.S. climatologist Kevin Trenberth has studied this for twenty years and has just published a detailed explanatory article [ http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2013EF000165/full ]. Trenberth emphasizes the role of long-term variations of ENSO, called pacific-decadal oscillation (PDO). Put simply: phases with more El Niño and phases with predominant La Niña conditions (as we’ve had recently) may persist for up to two decades in the tropical Pacific. The latter brings a somewhat slower warming at the surface of our planet, because more heat is stored deeper in the ocean. A central point here: even if the surface temperature stagnates our planet continues to take up heat. The increasing greenhouse effect leads to a radiation imbalance: we absorb more heat from the sun than we emit back into space. 90% of this heat ends up in the ocean due to the high heat capacity of water." The author also specifically says that when El Niño comes back, replacing La Niña once again, he predicts this will end the pause in global warming: "How important the effect of El Niño is will be revealed at the next decent El Niño event. I have already predicted last year that after the next El Niño a new record in global temperature will be reached again – a forecast that probably will be confirmed or falsified soon." The point is that your team is fumbling about trying to look what went wrong "My team"? Again you show your obsessive need to cast everything into us vs. them, tribalistic terms. Hint: truth about the natural world should not be determined by whether the people that typically take a certain position are on the right "team". Jesse -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. 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